Could a Lottery System Fix Discrimination in College Admissions?
“But what if Harvard created a fixed set of criteria that it deems desirable—say, an SAT score of 1470 or above, a 3.5 or higher GPA, a demonstrable interest and aptitude in particular non-academic activities, a record of overcoming obstacles, and so on? To continue to promote diversity, the school could give extra weight to certain applicants depending on, say, their zip code, the kind of high school they attended, their income, and their race. Then admissions officers could use those criteria to whittle down their batch of 40,000 applicants to a much-smaller pool of qualified contenders and from there select the final 2,000 or so through a lottery (not everyone who’s admitted attends). Proponents, including Warikoo, suggest that this approach could help Harvard (and other universities) avoid accusations of racial discrimination while still helping it achieve its goal of building a diverse class.”